


Not Your Choice

by STARSdidathing



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Avenger Loki, Bring tissues, Confessions, Emotional Hurt, Feels, Female Loki, Friends With Benefits, Genderfluid Character, Heavy Angst, Loki & Tony Stark Friendship, Loki Angst, Loki Feels, Loki Needs a Hug, M/M, Oblivious Tony, Ouch, Poor Loki, Post-Avengers (2012), Post-Thor: The Dark World, Sex, Shapeshifter Loki, Shapeshifting, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Unrequited Love, Wordcount: 1.000-5.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-21
Updated: 2017-03-21
Packaged: 2018-10-08 20:25:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10395378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/STARSdidathing/pseuds/STARSdidathing
Summary: It's all fun and games until someone falls in love.





	

**Author's Note:**

> In case the tags didn't warn you, this one is _going to hurt_. I had it titled "angst ball of angst fic" in my draft file. And while it could _conceivably_ have a happy ending, it would have to be worked for. So take a breath, prepare yourself and enjoy XD
> 
> p.s. This hasn't been read by my friend, who usually gives me the go ahead as it's "too angsty for her" sooo, here's hoping I don't have any major errors :/
> 
> p.p.s And ooh, ahh! Sixty fics! Whoo! :D :D How'd have thought, huh? Not that I'm complaining, hehe.

It started as a dare. Anthony hadn’t believed Loki’s shapeshifting was anything grander than his illusions; that surely he couldn’t change his entire _body_.

Loki had offered Anthony a practical demonstration, sliding himself into the skin of a beautiful woman and pressing Anthony against one of his worktables. Anthony’s arousal had been quick to form and Loki had laughed and encouraged him until Anthony had fucked his female form against the floor.

Loki had made sure to repeat the experience as soon and as often as he could. He would watch Anthony and he made a game of spotting who Anthony found attractive and modelling himself after them. It was generally women that he admired, but twice Anthony had even showed appreciation for men, much to Loki’s surprise.

Yet Anthony’s eyes on those occasions had been almost challenging - a further goad - and Loki had accepted it greedily, letting Anthony crowd him into a wall with the first male form and convincing Anthony to be beneath him - _taken_ by him on the second.

And it had been lovely in so many magnificent ways - and _painful_ in far too many others.

Loki had used his shapeshifting in the past with lovers, some had known it was him while others had simply shown interest in his guise and he’d been amused enough to encourage and accept them. 

But it was different with Anthony.

Anthony knew who he was but chose his skins for variety and amusement. He played with him, although Anthony hardly knew what it did - and Loki refused to tell him. He took on the form of whichever person could tempt Anthony, losing himself in the lies and the illusions. Because while it had started as amusement and dares it had... altered and Loki found himself searching out whomever he could form with more desperation. Anyone, as long as it got him Anthony.

Because Anthony didn't desire relationships. He didn't desire a single person.

He desired nights with people who wouldn’t search for commitment from him, who could hold his interest, and he found that with Loki. He _believed_ the simple nature of their arrangement and Loki was loathe to sway him from that thought. He’d hidden his feelings from the moment he’d noticed them, wrapped them in smirks and arrogance, buried them under cruel laughter and taunting words. He’d structured their game into something light-hearted and fun; a way to show off the many skills in his repertoire both as a shapeshifter and a lover. 

But as the months wore on, so did it wear on Loki’s composure.

He’d had nights in Anthony’s bed - had even slept curled up beside him, but only when he wore more delicate female forms. The kinds that Anthony liked to hold. 

But it didn’t mean Anthony wouldn’t take other lovers, and Loki tried to hide the way that... hurt him. He pretended it meant nothing, pretended he had lovers on other realms as well. He pretended he didn’t want Anthony to ask for him in his own skin just once.

But he never spoke of it.

They had maintained their tryst for over a year, and Anthony had even requested some forms more than once. Anthony was also a talented lover; he knew how to pleasure a woman _beautifully_ and even the few times Loki had been a man, Anthony hadn’t hesitated to take him in hand and mouth and had proven _brilliant_ in that area as well.

But it had been a year. A year of kissing Anthony, of being fucked by him, of being wrapped in his arms whenever he took the more petite shapes that Anthony liked pressed against him.

It meant... it meant holding onto his masks and pretending not to feel slightly gutted every time he threw on a facade to make Anthony touch him. It meant pretending their friendship was all that he desired from Anthony.

Because they _were_ friends. 

They spent hours in the labs together, fought Midgard’s enemies together. Anthony took him places, introduced him to new things, laughed with him and hugged him with glee whenever they had a breakthrough. Their game was just... a friendly, unthinking bit of fun. At least, that’s all it was to Anthony. ‘ _Friends with fabulous magical benefits_ ’ he called it. Loki just hated that his own form could never be the one to satisfy.

Being with Anthony was torment and bliss, and he was surprised it took as long as it did for him to crack underneath it.

He’d been on top of Anthony in the form of a buxom blonde and Anthony was gripping his hips. He was riding the other and Anthony was hard inside of him. Anthony was biting his lip and looking beautiful, gasping and throwing his head back as he let Loki wring pleasure from him.

Loki had bent down and kissed Anthony, his chest burning with want and with an ache he couldn’t fight. He didn’t even notice his form shifting until Anthony’s fingers twitched and he broke the kiss. Loki pulled back to find Anthony’s eyes wide and confused. 

“What?” he gasped out, his voice was rough with arousal and heavy with bewilderment. “W-Why are you, you?”

Loki had swallowed, frozen and torn, his eyes flicking over the other desperately even as thoughts rushed through his head. He tried to shift back, but his magic fought him, his _heart_ fought him until he simply stopped trying. He swallowed and made a decision. 

His body wasn’t prepared, not really; the forms weren’t able to shift to emulate each other the same way, but he _was_ aroused. His cock was hard against his stomach and it was enough. He sent out magic to do enough of a job so that he could grab Anthony’s cock with one hand and slide himself down onto it.

Anthony groaned and his hips twitched up, making Loki’s eyelashes flutter as he moaned. He was too tight and it almost burned. It was _wonderful_.

“Loki, ah, _what_ -”

Loki bent down to capture Anthony’s lips and halted the protest. “I want this,” he hissed, unable to curb the confession or hide the need, “you can do this _once_ , Anthony.”

Anthony’s eyes were wide, the beginning of realisation entering them before Loki lifted himself and twisted his hips, fucking himself on Anthony and making the mortal groan, curse, and thrust up into him.

They knew each other so well, even with Loki in an unfamiliar form ( _his form_ \- his pleasure, his body and _his **face**_ ) they knew how to draw out their pleasure, to make their toes curl and their bodies flare.

Loki still focused on the other man more than he ever did, running his hands over Anthony’s chest and kissing him. Mouthing at his neck, his jaw, capturing his lips and whining into Anthony’s mouth, pained little noises that couldn’t hide a thing.

He didn’t want to stop, but he also wanted to see, to _feel_ Anthony coming inside of _him_. He didn’t draw it out the way he could, he twisted instead and felt Anthony’s cock deep inside him, rubbing and hitting all the best places as he scrabbled his nails over Anthony’s chest.

It didn’t take him long to come, untouched, and with a half-formed sob, feeling Anthony following not long after him as Loki buried his own broken noises in another kiss with the man below him.

Loki was trembling slightly when he made himself climb off Anthony, but he didn’t even go far; he just wrapped himself around his lover and closed his eyes. Holding Anthony close to him and trying to ignore the dread he felt. Trying to pretend he hadn’t seen the guilt and shocked understanding that had slipped across Anthony’s expression.

Anthony’s next words only confirmed his realisation as he lay slightly stiff under Loki’s body. “You didn't tell me what this was doing to you.”

Loki tensed, he couldn’t stop himself, but he also curled closer, pressing his nose to Anthony’s neck and breathing in his scent.

“You would have stopped me long before now had you known,” he eventually answered, quietly.

“Loki...” Anthony murmured, sounding uncertain and stricken and Loki let out a shaking breath.

“I know,” he whispered, swallowing past his falling heart and bitter resignation. “I know this was our last night together.”

He knew Anthony too well after a year in his bed and two years as his friend. He knew that had the mortal wanted his true form he would have asked for it. He knew that if Anthony had wanted more from him, _loved_ him, then their game would never have strung along this far.

Loki had known, from the earliest days of his affections, that he was participating in a one-sided affair. One, that, while it remained simple, while it was free of complications and feelings, it and _he_ could stay palatable. His attraction, his _adoration_ , it made Anthony uncomfortable - guilty - and Loki had known it would be the outcome of telling him from the start.

He still had to try to change it.

“We could still continue?” Loki suggested quietly, bringing up a hand to lightly trace a pattern on Anthony’s cooling chest. “I have weathered far worse than having your touch under a different guise."

Anthony made a noise; a pained little sound that made Loki want to comfort him.

“ _Loki_ ,” Anthony whispered, and there was a well of sympathy, of _pain_ in that tone and it made Loki grimace and his shoulders tense. He wanted to withdraw on himself, to avoid the... the _pity_ he could see Anthony forming.

“Of course you would not let me,” Loki hissed under his breath, angry at himself more than the man beneath him. He laughed harshly. “You think that would hurt me _less_.”

“Can you say continuing this won’t?” He tried to urge Loki to look at him, but he refused. Anthony made an agitated noise. “You’re telling me this is better? Letting us fuck each other when it’s never you?”

“Then let it be me on occasion!” Loki snapped, unable to stop himself pushing up and away from the safety of Anthony’s skin. He looked down at the other, angry and glaring. “Let it be me sometimes. Rarely! Once in your Midgardian year! I do not care!” 

He shifted, moving his arms to rest on either side of Anthony’s shoulders, straddling him again and pressing their foreheads together. His words were forced out between gritted teeth, a brutally painful confession - a desperate plea. “I just need _you_. I don't care how deep or how shallow your feelings for me run.” He closed his eyes and clenched his fists. Still so furious with himself for what he had become, for a _mortal_ no less – but he was unable to stop, unable to silence his rough hiss, “I just need _you_.”

It was silent for a long moment before hesitant arms came up around Loki’s back and encouraged him to lie down. He all but collapsed against Anthony as he was hugged against the other’s body. A firm, calloused hand began to lightly rub his back. “Loki...” he started, “I...” 

But Anthony quickly seemed to run out of words.

Loki closed his eyes and uttered the one thing that rarely left his lips. “ _Please_ ,” he felt Anthony still. “Please,” he tried again, “I just... I wish to have you in some way, _any_ way.” He ran a careful hand up Anthony’s side, resting it beside his face on Anthony’s chest. He laid it flat against Anthony’s heart. “It doesn’t hurt you to allow, Anthony. It doesn’t have to change. It’s lust. It’s any image at your fingertips and from someone who you know will satisfy.”

"And what about how much I know I'm hurting you, huh?" Anthony asked softly. “What about that?”

Loki raised his head, looking at the other unflinchingly. “And to know you would hurt me more by taking even this away from me?"

Anthony looked conflicted at his response and for the first time since he’d realised what their evenings meant to Loki. It was the first chance for continuation that he’d spotted and Loki quickly pushed himself up, pushed himself _into_ the ruse. Shifting forms rapidly as he held Anthony’s eyes, searching for a hint of interest, of intrigue - he even plastered on an image of his Jotun form, knowing how curious Anthony had been by it.

But they only seemed to deepen the sadness in Anthony’s eyes, so Loki kept flickering, frantically. He was changing between one gorgeous image and another when Anthony’s hands came to cup his cheeks.

“Stop,” he requested, and Loki did. “Go back,” he requested and although Loki hesitated, he slowly let himself slide back into his own form. Anthony was looking at him with such genuine pain, such concern for him and it made his chest feel caved in. It made him feel agonizingly open to this man. "This is breaking your heart.”

It made Loki give a half smile that felt as hollow as he did. He brought up a hand to lightly brush Anthony’s cheek as he told him, “I didn't have much of one left, Anthony, and I've told you, its weathered far worse."

Anthony looked like he doubted that. “And what if I never love you back?”

Loki’s cheek twitched, the only physical reaction to show the sharp pain that had shot through his body. He swallowed, holding Anthony’s gaze and feeling every inch of his self-deprecation etch itself on his face. “Then you never love me back.”

Anthony shook his head, disbelieving and distressed and Loki’s fingers spasmed against his cheek with the wish to sooth that frown.

“That’s it?” Anthony asked softly when they’d fallen quiet. “That's what you're going to resign yourself to for the rest of my life? Sleeping with someone who’s such a fucking asshole that he never realized? Someone who never slept with your real form until you changed in the middle of sex and _begged_ him to?”

Loki gave a jerky shrug. “I hadn’t wanted you to realise, so I never said-”

“ _Loki_.”

“ _Yes_ , okay?” Loki spat, unable to stop himself. A year of repression spilling out of him in the face of Anthony’s worried, unhappy eyes. “What did you expect to hear? That I'm so pathetically in love with you that I would toss aside my own dignity, my own feelings to simple have time in your bed? Because we both know the truth of it, it's laying in front of us!”

He looked down at them, gestured with his hand and watched that ache carve itself deeper on Anthony’s face. He moved in closer suddenly, hissing his words with a rage that barely hid his fear; his fear of rejection, his fear of losing even _this_ with Anthony. “Do not try to do what is ‘best’ for me, Anthony. I know what is best and that is taking whatever I can get from you and damn the pain. The pain is worth the time spent in your arms.”

Anthony opened his mouth to speak, and Loki tensed, ready to argue any words he might say, to push and claw and _shift_. He would do anything he needed to convince Anthony that having this, _keeping_ this was what would be better for him.

In the end though, Anthony didn’t say anything, he just frowned and held Loki’s gaze, eyes swimming with sadness. He looked as if he was waiting for something.

Loki knew all the things Anthony wanted in that moment and they were all the things that Loki couldn’t bear to provide. He looked away from Anthony in the end, but only so that he could gently lower himself back down, tentatively resting his weight half on Anthony and half on the bed. He wrapped his arms around the other man and placed his head on Anthony’s shoulder. It was position he’d never taken as a man, only when he was small and female and Anthony was half asleep.

Slowly, _painfully_ slowly, Anthony’s arms came around him in return and Loki let out a relieved breath and relaxed further, clinging that little bit tighter.

“We're going to talk about it more,” Anthony said after a few minutes. “It's not being left like this.”

He’d known it. Loki had known from the moment he made his decision, he’d _admitted_ it when their pleasure had ended. _I know this was our last night together._

“Allow me tonight,” he asked, his voice more vulnerable than he’d ever want to admit.

It took a few seconds before he felt Anthony nod, accepting his request, and Loki closed his eyes. He knew it would be different come morning, that his nights with Anthony would likely disappear - but for tonight he could fall asleep wrapped in Anthony’s embrace and pretend that it was more.

Pretend that in the morning things would be different, that Anthony would decide to accept his proposal of continuation.

He pretended Anthony wasn’t far too kind to ever allow that.

He pretended that he wouldn’t have to accept Anthony saying no to him in the morning. That for one more time in his life, his heart wouldn’t be forced to break over a rejection. 

Because Loki didn't want to admit how terrified he was to think, that this time, it might hurt him even more.

**Author's Note:**

> Annnnnnd, yeah. Ouch, huh? While I can't make the fic much better by promising some kind of happy or hopeful ending sequel - I _can_ say that the next chapter of SYT is with my beta, so, that should be up soon! (Well, assuming you don't hurl too much weaponary at me for the pain of above, heh.) But, anyway hope you liked! ~~(I tried to keep Loki as IC as possible which was fucking hard when I was trying to make him all vulnerable and whatnot :/)~~


End file.
